A Great(coat) Auction

The great little literary journal, Greatcoat, is holding a silent auction to offset the cost of Issue Two, which will be out this summer. The auction has some great items, including books - many of them signed - handmade jewelry, handmade fabric items, a chess set, and many others.

Check out the auction here and bid for this cool journal.

See my interview with Greatcoat co-editor Elisabeth Whitehead here.

I Can Write and Edit FOR YOU TOO

As I've gotten older, I've realized that I'm very good at two things: writing and editing. That's why I'm officially offering my writing and editing services to you, the people of the world. But first, a little more about me, Isaac Sweeney.

I have wanted to be a writer since middle school. First, I wanted to be a songwriter and even learned to play the guitar because of it. Country music was my forte (go ahead and laugh). But the writing soon evolved into more complicated ventures such as poetry, fiction, and essays. I've made my money as an adult writing and editing for newspapers and magazines before I took my current adjunct teaching position at James Madison University, where I teach others how to be more effective writers and editors.

Basically, I have been writing and editing a lot for most of my life. I have published fiction, poetry, newspaper and magazine articles, and online articles. I have a master's degree in English with a concentration in creative writing. I'm a pretty modest person, but when it comes to writing and editing, I'm as confident as they come.

So, if you are interested, shoot me an email and we can talk more specifically about how we can help each other, prices, deadlines, and other business fancies.

Poetry in Movies

Since I seem to write a lot about poetry and movies, I thought I'd show a few clips of poetry in movies. Have fun. And if you know of any others, feel free to share.
















These are just a few. For a nice list, check out this link at Poetry.org.

Song Lyrics and Poetry

We were reading poetry in class and a few students said a song is "just a poem to music."

I disagree. I think a poem can be musical and song lyrics can be poetic, but they are different genres. One is not better than the other necessarily; they are just different. Song lyrics have music to help them succeed. A poem has to rely on just what's on the page. Maybe that's why poetry is often seen as more prestigious than songwriting.

What do you think? Do you see a difference in song lyrics and poetry?

Grading

Well I'm done grading and, less than 12 hours after submitting my final grades, I started getting a wave of emails questioning the grade. Mostly, the questions come from students who don't read the syllabus even though I've told them to read the syllabus and explained the grading about a thousand times. So I just sent out a bulk email explaining it again; I pretty much just copied from the syllabus and pasted it in the email.

What's wrong with students? Doesn't high school teach them to pay attention to directions and regulations? I guess it doesn't teach them that or how to write.

If you teach high school, please comment and tell me how I'm wrong.